Wednesday, February 04, 2009

Acapulco

Sounds romantic, doesn't it? There was a time when Acapulco was the ultimate in romantic getaways - but I think it's lost a lot of its nice. We tried to avoid coming into town at all, but we missed our turn. I think we were supposed to turn right, back at the little town that was only about eight blocks long - eight blocks of solid traffic jam. Have you ever had the desire to jump out of your car, leap up on the roof, and start yelling "Listen, idiots!" Either all the intersections were four-way stops, or there were no stops. I'm not sure. At any rate, every intersection was a knot of cars and trucks and buses and us, nobody moving, everybody except me honking (and no, I wasn't causing the snarl!) Between the intersections, there was a parade - a very slow-moving, sometimes not-moving - parade of the vehicles that had managed to bully their way onto the highway. All I could think about was getting through the mess. Eventually, I did, and it soon became apparent that I had driven right into Acapulco - and right into a construction zone.

Well. I didn't hit anybody, and I didn't get lost in a maze of tiny streets. With Robin's help, (he of the excellent map reading skills) I drove calmly down the coast road and went through two separate cities, to all appearances. Is there a Nuevo Acapulco now?

I finally made a wrong choice - I knew that I had, but couldn't help it, traffic being what it was - and ended up on one of those tiny dirt and pot-hole streets. I turned left at the next corner and stopped. There was a little store there, with a taxi parked in front of it. We asked the taxi driver to lead us to this RV park, and he did. Even he had to stop to ask directions.

All that was about three hours ago. It was still light outside, but Robin had had enough for the day - which had started out, after all, with a trip to the tire shop, so that we didn't actually get on the road until 11:00 o'clock. We also try not to drive at night here (remember my description of the topes?). So we rented a space at Diamante Acapulco RV Park. It's not a thing of beauty, but it is a place to sleep. It has electricity and wi-fi - and Robin says it has two swimming pools.

TJ and Kris hadn't had enough fun yet, I guess, so they decided to keep going. I have a feeling we won't see them again until we get to the Yucatan, because they're talking about going all the way down to Playa Escondido and then cutting across. Robin prefers to catch the expressway, which is very close to here, and head toward Mexico City, then detour later (I hope!) We will keep in touch via Facebook, though, and hook up earlier if we can.

So buen viaje, TJ and Kris! And good-night, all.

3 comments:

Kathryn Magendie said...

Oh! this makes me want to travel somewhere exotic and new!

Unknown said...

No that sounds like a day & a half...the image of an RV pulled over to ask a cabbie directions on a small dirt street is really memorable; your day seems like the sort of escapade that may be fun in the telling later on, but probably was pretty gruesome in the actual experience.

Sandra Leigh said...

I think the most gruesome part of driving through Acapulco was the anticipation. The city's reputation preceded it. As soon as I knew I had gone off course, I stopped and got help. We've traveled in Mexico every winter for the last six years, and we have always found people to be very friendly and helpful. That said, I'm glad to have left Acapulco behind. That's not Mexico - that's Acapulco.

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